I am truly saddened to report that Hans Meuer passed away this week at his home in Daisbach, Germany. He was 77.
Many of you may have known Hans from his longtime work as the founder of the International Supercomputing Conference and the co-founder of the TOP500 list.
Prof. Dr. Hans Meuer is the Managing Director of Prometeus GmbH and the ISC General Chair. He is Professor Emeritus of Computer Science at the University of Mannheim, Department of Mathematics and Computer Science. In 1986, he became co-founder and organizer of the first Mannheim Supercomputer Conference, which has been held annually ever since. Hans Meuer has been the ISC General Chair from the very beginning. In 1993, Hans Meuer started the TOP500 initiative together with Erich Strohmaier and Jack Dongarra. Hans Meuer received his doctorate in mathematics in 1972 from RWTH Aachen University, Germany. He has been involved in data processing and computer science for more than 45 years. He served as specialist, project leader, group and department chief during his 11 years at the Research Center in Jülich, Germany, from 1962–1973. For the following 26 years, he was Director of the Computer Center at the University of Mannheim, Germany, and Professor of Computer Science for 28 years. Since 1998, he has been Managing Director of Prometeus GmbH, the service company specialized in the field of High Performance Computing.
Hans is survived by his wife, Ursula, his sons, Andreas, Martin and Thomas, daughter-in-laws, his grandchildren, his twin sister, nephews and nieces, as well as friends, colleagues and the entire ISC team. The funeral service will take place in Daisbach on Monday, January 27 at 2 p.m.
I first met Hans Meuer at ISC’07 in Dresden. I was Andy Bechtolsheim’s assistant at the time when we were on travel at Sun, and Hans was rather agitated at me because Andy was not to be found in the speaker’s queue seating area just minutes before his keynote. I took the heat and promised Hans I would make it happen. In the end, it all worked out and Andy did a great job.
Years later, I ran into Hans in Hamburg and he pulled me aside to tell me, “Andy Bechtolsheim was never more effective than when you were his aide.”
These are the kind of memories I will hang onto for the rest of my life. Hans was a remarkable man, and supercomputing will never be the same without him.
This is indeed a very sad day for everyone in the HPC world……
That sounds so much like Hans.
Here’s another story that concerns you..
At your first ISC as an insideHPC publisher,
someone who had never met you came to the registration desk asking for help to locate you. Hans happened to be there and said that it is not hard to spot you as you are “the only man with a red hat on his head and cold German beer in his hand.”
That description somehow got stuck onto you 🙂